The NBA is sleeping on this...

The NBA and especially ESPN are sleeping on the magic. The so-called worldwide leader in sports has released their power rankings for every team over the next three years, and somehow a healthier Magic team with a new coach has dropped from seventh place to 21st. We'll break down this tomfoolery and shenanigans on this edition of Magic Digest. Yes, tomfoolery and shenanigans. What's good with it? It's your big gunk Eric, back again with Magic Digest down here in Central Florida trying to beat this rain, but I hope wherever you are, you stay cooler than the polar bear's toenails as we get into the weekend, man. I hope that y'all enjoying some good football. NBA basketball is coming closer and closer. We're only a few weeks away from preseason. I'm excited, man. Man, it's just a lot going on, a lot going on. We're going to get into these crazy so-called future power rankings over sent out by ESPN. But before we do that, I want to let you know that this episode is brought to you by good folks over at Calshi. On Calshi, you're trading directly against other users, not the house like traditional sports books. You're buying yes or no contracts on the outcome of events across sports, politics, or even the weather. For example, I'm excited about the WNBA, man. Those it's some ballers over there, man. And if we look at the market for the WNBA MVP winner, man, it's looking like Aja Wilson got this thing wrapped up again. She is the goat and it wouldn't be, you know, it really wouldn't be a question if she had it wrapped up. But I look at that small chance that somebody who could, who is probably considered the best player on the best team and a rookie doing things that, you know, are amazing, astounding every day might have a chance. And that is my favorite W player, Olivia miles, you know, the spectacle. And if you were to put $25 on her to win the MVP, yes, that could give you a payout of $468 and 80 cents, man, go ahead and get involved in the action. Thanks to our good friends, how she, if you're interested in trying out couch, you use the link in the description, trade $25 with code digest NBA and get 25 added to your account instantly. Big thanks to our good friends over at cow. She now let's just go ahead and get into this ESPN future power rankings. I was listening to a podcast. Uh, what is it? The who collective with Brian wind horse and Bobby Marks and a band McMahon and Bobby Marks actually puts this together. Uh, he's been doing it for years now. There's actually, uh, if, if we can explain it, so let me slow down. Basically it's there, how they come up with, they just come up with these numbers of how they rank each team over the next three years, not just their record, but just everything. And we'll, we'll break it down here in a little bit. It's their insiders each giving their own ranking and then they average it out. And that's how they come up to where you stand. If we take a look at their actual criteria right here, it gives you sort of a breakdown of how we got to what they did. Uh, so if you look at the Orlando magic, they have a score and a ranking. So they, the categories are players management draft money and market. And this is basically them predicting how good you are in these categories. Over the next three years, we see that for players, the magic scored a 59 and ranked 15 and management. They scored a 45 rank 20 in draft. They scored 33 and ranked 22 in money. They scored a 23 and ranked 28. That's almost the last is not the last is not the absolute bottom, but it's near the bottom. And then in market 52 and rank 16. So that is how they come up with whatever, uh, number this is last year. They were ranked seventh. The Orlando magic were ranked seventh in their future predictions. And now they are ranked 21st. And how does this happen? What are they basing this off? What is this? Let me just say this right now. A lot of this is narrative driven. A lot of this is narrative driven. A lot of this is agenda driven, but I will say this as a fan of the magic. I am someone who participates in magic media. And just as a listener, if you are a fan and you watch magic basketball games, there's one thing that we have to do to take accountability is that the magic have earned any negative perspective of them because of their actual play. Now that don't mean that we don't rock with this team. And that don't mean that we don't still love this team. Even if you are diehard, think the team is going to go 80 to a no. And when the chip was good with it, leave a comment down below, but we still have to have some accountability for how we have performed these last few years and what that idea gives people on the outside looking in. That being said, that don't mean that this ain't some just ridiculousness. Let's just go ahead and break it in down. First, they start off with a three-year outlook and each of their people provide a section in this story. I'm sure they all had write-ups for everything, but they probably just took a chunk from each person. This one was for Zach Cram. And he said, three-year outlook after another season in which the magic theoretically talented roster never fully meshed is much harder to trust that the team will ever put it all together with this core. And now the magic are out of a bunch of future pigs because of the Desmond Baines trade and staring down one of the toughest cap sheets in the league with new head coach, Sean Sweeney, and you ain't saying nothing. We don't know. You ain't saying nothing that we don't know, but also it is a situation where they brought in a new guy. We got to give him time. We got to give him time. I know that the magic already have an established core, but one that core has never played healthy, a full season to really show their potential. And they were still young. I mean, they're still young. We're talking about guys, 25, 26. I know a lot of times we just be like, that's where it ends, but they still have room to grow. They still have room to grow. I believe they still have room to grow, but that brings us to the roster questions. This one was posed by Bobby Marks. Will future finances play a role in extension talks with Anthony black, the magic have been aggressive in recent years and rookie extension negotiations signing Cole, Anthony Jalen sucks, Franz Wagner, and Paolo, Ben Carroll, the long-term deals, but with five players earning more than 20 million next season, including three getting paid north of 40 million. Can Orlando afford going into the luxury tax for second consecutive season? And again, if you paid attention to any podcast that, unless this is your very first podcast here on the magic digest. And if it is, I welcome you. Do you know, these are the things that we've been talking about. We have been talking about these things for a while. Now we know that the magic are in an interesting salary cap crunch, especially when you brought on Desmond Bain at such a large number, you already had your two homegrown talents in Paolo and France that were making a good money and subs you, you did. I mean, the magic usually tend to extend their players and they extend them usually at nice player friendly deals. We just know this. We can't go back and litigate that, relitigate that and change it. We just know that then you bring in Desmond Bain at his contract, you give up a lot to get him. It just makes everything that much tougher, but we know this. And I still believe that there is meat on this bone. People are acting like it's been picked clean. That is over. No, there is still meat on the bone. There are still games for the magic to go out there and win. And this team given a chance, given the ability, Hey, if it falls off, Hey, then we, we know we'll get to that later, but I'm just saying there's still meat on the bone as we keep going with this. Cause you know, they do these little sections. Um, I'll leave a link down below where you can read it, but I mean, I'm giving it to you all right here. If we keep on going, we see that this is their own future, uh, power rankings nugget to know where it seems like they're even doubting the stuff that they're putting out. Like, how are we supposed to, you know, trust them as the so-called worldwide leader in sports when they don't even trust the own, their own articles as they're writing, but I'll go, I digress. Let's continue. Three years ago, the future power ranking ranked Orlando number 23. The magic already had most of their current core in place buying Carol Wagner sucks and window Carter jr. But the magic had the 10th best record in the subsequent three years to exceed expectations three years later. And their ranks are all very similar. Are we under us? Are we underestimating their players and management again? Yes. Yes. Yes. That's simple. And I get it again. I get it. It, the magic have under performed. The magic have underperformed. You guys in the comments have let me know. Oh man, the magic didn't do this. The magic didn't go out and have a great, excuse me. The magic didn't go out and have a great off season. They didn't go in and swing the bat and bring in as many high quality, high paid, uh, free agents as you may have thought they didn't go address the specific things that you may think they had, they needed to address. So you can feel, Hey, the day are underwhelming or whatever, but I still think that the, it's all about perception, especially when you're talking about rankings and list last year, the magic or the darlings, they were looked at as the team that was going to be the surprise, the underdog that comes out of, you know, it was like a made for TV movie. They were going to just rise up into these scrappy little guys and take everybody's heart over. And when they failed to achieve that automatically is like, yo, get them up out of here. We don't care about them at all. And it ain't that simple. You know, it ain't that simple. There is way more involved here that you have to bring into play. We just know that despite what he may have been as a man, his character, things like that, the connection with coach Mose just didn't exist last season. And it broke down and deteriorated as we saw. Also, we do have to talk about the fact that injuries have played a major part. And it hasn't been like somebody with a reoccurring injury that just doesn't get better. It's the simple fact of these guys are doing so much like take the case of France. They're doing so much playing basketball, so many different ways that they ain't really letting their bodies heal. And the fact that that was addressed this off season, you see Paolo back in the gym, back in the weight room, back on his personal fitness tip, looking better physically than I've seen him in years. You see France back to just working on his game, like working on his game, improving, trying to, you know, be a better player. We see all these guys really showing that dedication this off season that you want from a team that has expectations to go out there and compete. And so I'm very happy with what we're seeing. And let's just get into the last bold prediction. This is what they have as their bold prediction. This was from Ben Goliver and no disrespect to any of these writers. I, I, I, I consume their, you know, content, Ben Goliver, Bobby Marks. I know these guys know more about the NBA than most people will ever, even they'll forget more than you'll ever remember. But at the same time, it ain't all altruistic. Let's just keep that bold prediction for 2729. Ben Cameron Wagner will split up in four seasons together. The two fours have never led an offense that ranked higher than 18. One obvious problem. Both are career, 32% three-point shooters. If Sweeney can't find a quick fix to unlock the offense in the first season as the magic's coach, Orlando will struggle to find a struggle to avoid, avoid a fourth straight first round playoff exit. The magic have committed major money to Boncaro Wagner, Bane and sucks. So maneuvering out of these tight salary camp quarters will probably require dissolving the front court tandem. And with that, I say, I got a bold prediction. I got a bold prediction for you. I think Sean Sweeney is going to be able to figure out an offensive strategy that puts this magic team in better situations. Do you look out there and see a depth of shooting? No, I'm gonna just be honest. We, they, we know Bane can do it. We know Tristan, the silver has the potential. I think Penda, if he gets a bigger role, we'll be able to hit some shots. Jace, we'll be able to hit some shots depending on their role. I think that we need, I still think that we need, he needs to develop a system, Sean Sweeney, that gets Paolo and Bane Carol better shots, and that will unlock their office of efficiency. That's just what I feel. That's my bold prediction. But what about you? What are your bold predictions? What is your power ranking for this Orlando magic team? Drop it down below in the comments. I'm gonna get up out of here. It's your big on Eric for magic digest.